Græsk: Sammensat begreb af
atom og
krig.
Enhver form for væbnet konflikt, krigsførelse, hvori
der benyttes eller trues med
anvendelse af atomvåben. Anden verdenskrig var den første atomkrig pga
Hiroshima og Nagasaki.
Selv om alle medlemmer af
atomvåbenklubben formodentlig har planer for anvendelse
af kernevåben i tilfælde
af krig, er det kun den amerikanske
SIOP-plan fra 1962? - med senere varianter - som er offentliggjorte.
According to Launch on Warning, 'Under the circumstances of the
U.S.-Soviet Cold War, a launch-on-warning capability was a logical
consequence of nuclear planning. Many Soviet targets were "time
urgent" military ones that would have to be destroyed quickly. By
the early 1950s, soon after Moscow began producing nuclear weapons,
those Soviet nuclear facilities and nuclear delivery systems that
could be detected became a prime target for U.S. nuclear war
planning. Because those forces posed the great threat to the United
States and its allies, U.S. military commanders and intelligence
agencies looked closely for signs that the Soviet leadership might
be preparing them for use in a surprise attack. By the mid-1950s,
the commanders of U.S. strategic nuclear forces readily assumed
that if they received "strategic warning" of an impending Soviet
attack, it would be essential to stage a quick preemptive launch of
SAC bombers on Soviet strategic nuclear and command and control
targets. Consistent with this, the first Single Integrated
Operational Plan (SIOP), approved by President Dwight Eisenhower in
the fall of 1960, included preemptive and retaliatory options for
massive nuclear attacks on the most threatening Soviet
targets'.USAs daværende præsidentRichard M. Nixon truede med at anvende
atomvåben mod Nordvietnam under Vietnamkrigen.